EDITORIAL: Bigfoot: Big story or tall tale?

Published: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 at 10:20 AM.

Don’t cancel that camping trip just yet. After a 35-year hiatus, there is renewed talk about Bigfoot stalking the forests of Northwest Florida — but there are no photos of the critter, no detailed sightings and, of course, no carcass for experts to examine.
So there’s probably no Bigfoot. Does anyone take these stories seriously?
Apparently Omar Helms and his father, Joel Helms, do. The Helmses said they were exploring woods southwest of their home in DeFuniak Springs on Jan. 29 when they discovered a footprint 17 inches long and an inch deep. “It appeared to have four or five toes, with a distinct heel and arch,” the younger Helms told the Destin Log’s Jessica Coker. “It was obviously a Bigfoot footprint.”
The Helmses took pictures and made a plaster mold of the print.
We’re wondering why, if the creature had been ambling through the area, it left only one footprint. But never mind. A report on the Helmses’ discovery was one of the best-read items on the Daily News’ website this month.
Bigfoot is a catch-all name for apelike animals of unknown species that some people believe lurk in America’s forests. Most Bigfoot reports come from the Pacific Northwest. In Florida, stories of a foul-smelling animal called the “skunk ape” are common in the Everglades and other swampy regions.
There is no proof that these animals exist. Most scientists are skeptical.
The last time Bigfoot made big waves in Northwest Florida was in 1978, after a red-eyed Bigfoot allegedly visited a rural home near East Brewton, Ala., one night in March. East Brewton is just above Santa Rosa County’s northern border. The incident got a fair amount of publicity. This newspaper ran a detailed account of it.
Details often are hard to come by. Our report on the Helms footprint referred to two recent sightings listed on bigfootfinder.com. The accounts were posted by someone who said he had been on a “field training exercise” in “the woods of northwest FL.” No names. No dates. No specific location.
Both the bigfootfinder.com accounts, by the way, described the creature as standing 9 feet. A tall story in more ways than one.

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Don’t cancel that camping trip just yet. After a 35-year hiatus, there is renewed talk about Bigfoot stalking the forests of Northwest Florida — but there are no photos of the critter, no detailed sightings and, of course, no carcass for experts to examine.
So there’s probably no Bigfoot. Does anyone take these stories seriously?
Apparently Omar Helms and his father, Joel Helms, do. The Helmses said they were exploring woods southwest of their home in DeFuniak Springs on Jan. 29 when they discovered a footprint 17 inches long and an inch deep. “It appeared to have four or five toes, with a distinct heel and arch,” the younger Helms told the Destin Log’s Jessica Coker. “It was obviously a Bigfoot footprint.”
The Helmses took pictures and made a plaster mold of the print.
We’re wondering why, if the creature had been ambling through the area, it left only one footprint. But never mind. A report on the Helmses’ discovery was one of the best-read items on the Daily News’ website this month.
Bigfoot is a catch-all name for apelike animals of unknown species that some people believe lurk in America’s forests. Most Bigfoot reports come from the Pacific Northwest. In Florida, stories of a foul-smelling animal called the “skunk ape” are common in the Everglades and other swampy regions.
There is no proof that these animals exist. Most scientists are skeptical.
The last time Bigfoot made big waves in Northwest Florida was in 1978, after a red-eyed Bigfoot allegedly visited a rural home near East Brewton, Ala., one night in March. East Brewton is just above Santa Rosa County’s northern border. The incident got a fair amount of publicity. This newspaper ran a detailed account of it.
Details often are hard to come by. Our report on the Helms footprint referred to two recent sightings listed on bigfootfinder.com. The accounts were posted by someone who said he had been on a “field training exercise” in “the woods of northwest FL.” No names. No dates. No specific location.
Both the bigfootfinder.com accounts, by the way, described the creature as standing 9 feet. A tall story in more ways than one.